Boehner: W.H. 'trying to play games'

Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-Ohio) is calling it “outrageous” for the government to release illegal immigrants from detention before the sequester deadline and says the White House is “trying to play games”

“This is very hard for me to believe that they can’t find cuts elsewhere in their agency. I frankly think this is outrageous and I’m looking for more facts but I can’t believe that they can’t find the kind of savings they need out of the department short of letting criminals go free,” Boehner told CBS Evening News anchor Scott Pelley on Tuesday.

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“I think that the administration is trying to play games — play games with the American people, scare the American people. This is not, this is not leadership,” Boehner said.

“You just accused the White House of fear mongering,” Pelley replied.

“They’re out there making a lot of noise. What they really ought to be doing is coming up to the Hill and working with the Senate Democrats to pass a bill that can replace the sequester and begin a deal with our long-term spending problem,” he said.

The Associated Press reported on Monday that the Department of Homeland Security is releasing some illegal immigrants being held in immigration jails in advance of automatic budget cuts set to go into effect later this week. A spokeswoman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Gillian Christensen, says the immigrants were being held around the country and being released and “placed on an appropriate, more cost-effective form of supervised release.” She did not say how many immigrants were released or how they were selected.